A/N: Happy One-Year Anniversary for Blind Trust!

It really has been 365 days since this entire FanFic started. How the time has flown by!

I worked really hard to get this up before the end of the day, and, I'm not sure where any of my readers live, but here, I still have 1 and 1/2 hours until the 9th of September, so I made the cut-off!

So who wants quicker, more frequent updates? If the answer to that question is yes than I have an easy 2-second solution for you:

REVIEW!

It really helps me sort out my ideas when I see you are all enjoying what I'm writing, so please please please help that process by letting me know if I disappointed you, surprised you, or just made the reading experience enjoyable.

Whatever it is, let me know, because if you don't review, I have no idea... :(

And to those who are reviewing, you are not going unnoticed! Even on my darkest days when I open my email and notice 5 new FanFiction reviews (or favorites/followers), it just brightens my mood.

Thank you for reading this long authors note; I'm sure it's very boring.

...So... ON WITH CHAPTER 31 :D

It wasn't a vision after all.

She was standing there, in the mist. Danny could've sworn he saw Tucker's brightly colored shirt and Jazz's turquoise pants.

They weren't supposed to be here. This wasn't right. They were all supposed to be safe at home. Not risking their lives to save him. He was doing just fine.

More figures came into view. Danny could hardly tell who was who. His blurred vision only noticed the colors of clothes. He could only assume the black blob moving around was Sam.

Then, four of the figures split from the other. There was one sole person still in his eyesight, and he could tell by the orange glow that the figure had to be Kim.

…and he had to save her.

He made himself get up. He had to tell her to go away. He pressed on his right arm, but the weight was too much, and the elbow gave under pressure. He managed to catch himself just in time with his left arm. The motion made him feel nauseous. He couldn't hold it in. He rolled onto his side, and retched onto the ground, but nothing was able to come out. He hadn't eaten anything that day.

Through his distressed dry-heaves, he heard her small feet approach. Her hands fluttered over him as he lay, afraid to touch him. Finally, she let her cool palm rest against the side of his face.

"You're not immortal, Danny," he heard her say, and it sounded like her voice was full of tears.

"Not even close," Danny agreed, and he let himself fade away into her smooth caresses.

Blackness came soon after. He felt a surge of energy as his body tried to keep him alive and changed back to human form, but the aftereffect just made him feel all the more tired, and it felt so good to close his heavy eyes.

"Danny stay with me, ok?" a voice drew him back to the present.

It hurt to be awake. He felt as if his head had been split open. A knife of agony raked through his side every time he tried to draw a breath. A fire burned on the bridge of his nose, and a new pain aroused on his left foot. He wasn't even sure where that one had come from.

"What's my name?" she asked, testing his head.

"Kim…" he muffled. His tongue felt swollen in his far-too-small mouth.

"Who's your sister?"

"Jazz."

"What city do you live in?"

It all felt so stupid. "Who cares?"

"Come on, we gotta get you out of here," panic had risen in her voice.

"Kim, I'm kidding."

"You're hilarious. You should see your hilarious face right now. Can you get up?"

He didn't answer. He wasn't quite sure.

Noting his silence, Kim stepped forward. She raised his torso into a sitting position as he bit back a scream, his eyes beginning to form tears.

"Can you stand?" she asked, looking skeptical. He thought he could. Using her shoulder for support, Danny pushed off the ground, and immediately regretted doing so. The blood rushed away from his head, and he felt himself sway as the world was going dark. His skin was now cold and clammy, and he was struck with another wave of nausea. Kim caught him roughly – her strength just barely making up for the height difference – and he put all his weight against her. As he pressed into her, she realized all the grime and sweat and ectoplasm and blood that covered Danny's face and body was all over Kim's clothes. But it was too late now.

"Step with your right foot now, Danny," Kim instructed, and he listened. He began to transfer the weight to only his left leg when it felt like a cold knife had just stabbed into the ankle joint. The swelling pain made his knee give, and he would have collapsed if Kim had not been there, supporting him. He let out a groan that he'd been holding in for a while now.

"We'll go slow, okay?" she offered. "Put your arm around my shoulder. Go on."

He looped his left arm around Kim's neck, and she placed her right under his arm pit as she struggled to help him hobble.

She felt him begin to sway the other way, but she held on tighter, and told him, "Danny, you need to stay awake, okay? You might have a head injury."

Danny found himself nodding, but her words had no real meaning. He'd always wondered if that rule were even true. He certainly didn't think so. At least not now, when sleep felt so right. How could something so natural be so bad for you? Danny's foggy mind simply reasoned it couldn't.

There was a numbness tingling his extremities and his fingers and toes seemed paralyzed for as far as he could tell. Was is so bad that he wished the feeling-less sensation would travel up the rest of his body? He knew that would happen if he could just close his eyes for a moment…

He felt himself slipping to the subconscious again when Kim nudged him in the gut – something that excited knifes of pain he didn't even know were there. He gasped, but she wasn't backing down.

"Tell me about the day you got your powers."

"Why would I…"

"Do it now, Danny."

Something in the way she talked made Danny obey every word she said. So, he began as the two wobbled towards something in the distance.

"I was 14…" he began. His voice sounded foreign, like it wasn't coming from his mouth. He could feel his lips moving but the slurred and slow tone did not register any memories in his brain.

"Sam was really… really in…terested in the Ghos'… Portal. …said let's go inside. …'No Sam! bad idea!'… that was what I… what I said."

They paused here. He needed to catch his breath from all the walking and talking.

As they began to move again, Danny's lips did, too.

"'twas a dare… jus' a dare… Sam thought it be funny…. Wasn't funny though… so I… I suited up… there was a flash and–"

"Okay Danny, I'm gonna need you to step up onto the Specter Speeder now," Kim interrupted his tale to tell him. Danny only nodded, and Danny tried to climb on. He didn't want to disappoint Kim, but he couldn't do it. It was too high, and he was in too much pain.

Kim knew this wasn't going to work out. There was no way she alone could get Danny up and onto the Speeder. She'd need some sort of help.

"Ron!" she called, suddenly remembering a third party who was instructed to stay on the ship.

But there was no answer. She tried it a little louder. "RON."

Still nothing.

Where did he go? She wondered, aggravated and confused.

But there was no time to meddle in that. She needed to get Danny somewhere else where he could lie down. A place he could lie down would be most helpful, but where was she going to find that?

On the Specter Speeder. She thought grimly.

She could fly both of them up onto the Specter Speeder, but that wasn't going to work out. There was no way to get into the tiny door way other than to

…other than to go intangible!

Danny – who was quickly losing consciousness – felt Kim's arms loop around his armpits, and lift him into the air. She turned both he and she intangible, and entered into the Specter Speeder.

Once inside, she gently lay Danny down, and stretched her arms that were not used to the extra weight. He was propped up against the wall and the floor, and Kim kneeled to his right.

"Tell he what hurts," she told him.

Danny's mind was so clouded by pain he could give her only one response: "Everything?"

"Specifically."

"My face, my leg, my chest, my head, what else do you want?" he sighed, sounding very defeated.

She nodded, and told him calmly, "That's enough, thank you."

"I'll be right back," she told him, and he tried to nod, but he didn't think he did a very good job.

She came back bearing a bucket of water and a sponge. In her arms was also a tray of things like scissors and gauze and tape. Danny figured she'd gotten it all from his parent's extensive first aid kit located in the bathroom of the vehicle.

She sat back down where she had just previously been, and dipped the sponge into the bucket. She squeezed it a bit so that it wouldn't drip, and held it above Danny's head.

"This may sting a bit. It's water, but it's mixed with some antibiotics and antiseptics," she warned him.

Danny didn't even have the energy to nod, but the message was conveyed, and he readied himself to the best of his abilities.

Her fairy-light fingers brushed his black bangs away, and he felt the cool sponge come in contact with his clammy skin. She swirled it around his forehead, and began rubbing it in vertical stripes to clear his forehead of any and all dirt and grime. Luckily, there were no horrible cuts on his forehead – just a few scrapes and one very nasty looking bruise, but nothing too severe.

She squeezed the sponge onto the empty tray, and dipped it back into the bucket for another round. She worked the sponge in cool circles surrounding his eyes and cheeks. The moment the sluice came in contact with the side of his nose, he hissed in agony. The sharp intake of breath sent a ripple effect through the rest of his body, and ignited a fire under his chest.

"Okay," Kim told him patiently. "I'll be gentle, but I've got to get this cleaned."

She wiped down the bridge of his nose which resulted in another sharp intake of breath from the young ghost boy. She needed to wipe the blood and ectoplasm out of the nose, but it kept hurting Danny. She went in for another dive, and stroked along the sides, reaching his nostrils.

Finally, the nose was clear enough that Kim could distinctly see the swelling and crookedness of it – a dead-giveaway that his nose was in fact broken.

She reached over to the emptied contents of the tray, and grabbed a white gauze-like padding. She'd seen her mom set a broken nose once before, and knew how to do it… theoretically of course. But how hard could it be?

She undid the packaging of the sheet of gauze, and warned Danny once more, "You broke your nose. I need to set it, but it's going to hurt. Are you ready?"

This time Danny did nod. In some back part of his brain he felt like he still recognized pain, but the numbness was spreading to his forearms, and it made Danny feel relief.

With unpracticed hands, Kim placed one end of the sticky gauze to the left side of his nose. As she pulled the tape across the bridge, she set the bones in a straight line. A scream of pure pain tore through Danny's mouth, but Kim didn't pause. She just kept aligning the small fractured bones. She placed the other side of the adhesive on the right side of his nose, and smoothed out both edges for any bumps.

Danny was left panting, his eyes half-lidded with exhaustion, but he nonetheless gazed straight into Kim's wonderful sage eyes.

"That part's over, Danny," she told him with eyes full of love. He nodded once more.

She doused the sponge into the water once more, and continued to wipe down his neck. It was a problem when she came in contact with his white t-shirt.

"I'm gonna need to cut this off," she told him. Danny didn't mind. It was just a shirt; he had plenty.

She reached over to the tray, and grasped the scissors. Beginning at the bottom, Kim made small and precise snips up the middle-line of the shirt. She got to the neckline, finally, and began to pull it apart. She stopped herself just in time from gasping.

The normally smooth yet rigid muscles of the ghost hybrid's chest were now covered in yellow bruises. She was afraid to touch them. Each discolored shadow on his chest was either swollen or just large and dark. Regardless, it was clearly painful.

Kim looked up to meet Danny's teal eyes, and knew this next part was going to hurt more than his nose did. Only she couldn't find Danny's eyes. They were hidden behind closed lids of the exhausted ghost boy. A surge of panic rose in her, and she nudged – perhaps too hard – Danny in the gut.

He gasped, a deep inhalation of breath, at the sudden motion, and then moved one sore arm to a spot on his stomach. He held it in pain. Kim placed her hand on top of Danny's, and looked him straight in the eyes.

"I promise you'll be able to sleep soon, Danny. Just hang in there."

He closed his eyes once more, but not from exhaustion. They were pinched tightly shut in pain. She realized he was still clutching the left side of his chest.

"Does it hurt there?" she asked, a bit stupidly.

Danny did nothing but nod, just barely.

"Let me look at it," she told him.

Begrudgingly, Danny slipped his hand away, and let Kim take a look. She had to bite back a gasp herself.

The area that he had been holding was dark purple but with a few lime green splotches. It was a linear shape across the side of his chest. She knew immediately what that meant.

"You cracked your rib Danny. Maybe even two or three by the size of this bruise."

Danny chuckled, but laughing hurt so he immediately stopped, and instead just smiled. "I could've told you that, Kim."

Kim could only roll her eyes. Danny was the only person she knew that even when he had near-death injuries could laugh. It was remarkable in a way.

Getting back to work, Kim began to scrub away the area around his huge bruise as well as the rest of his chest. She carefully avoided the bruised area until she could stall no more.

"You may want to bite down on something. This could hurt."

Danny shook his head with his signature cocky smile already plastered onto his face, and refused to bite on anything. Kim couldn't help but wonder if it was because he didn't even have the strength for that.

She carefully glazed the sponge over the injury, and watched as Danny hissed in pain. Kim had broken ribs before. She knew that it hurt: broken ribs hurt to touch, to breathe, to laugh, to cough. It's surprising how much you need your ribs; you don't even realize it until the day you're without one.

She was done in a matter of seconds, and the pain in him began to subside once more.

She reached for the scissors herself at the Danny's feet.

"These are gonna have to come off, too, Danny," she told him, signaling to his pants. Danny was mortified. But it was clear there was no discussion on the matter for Kim was already snipping away the denim material.

When she had cut all the way through, she pulled them off Danny, and slid them out from under him and flung the trashed fabric away with the discarded shirt.

His legs, as a whole, did not look nearly as bad as his chest, but there were a few problem areas. His left ankle looked three times its usual size and was a purple-ish red color. There were not as many, but still quite a few blobs of bright green in his foot. It illuminated the whole room, and shown on Kim's face. Ectoplasm was a curious thing.

She went to touch the foot, but a soft, barely audible voice stopped her.

"Don't."

"Danny, I have to," she sympathized with him.

He could only shake his head no. An immense feeling of empathy pulsated through Kim; she'd been in this spot before – so much pain that she couldn't move. It sucked; it worse than sucked – it was just downright depressing. It made you crave death. But she wouldn't allow Danny to feel like that.

"I promise that it gets worse before it gets better. Once I set your foot, you'll feel so much better."

Tears had formed in the ghost boy's eyes, but he immediately dried them up, and nodded a shaky, unsure nod.

Kim began her soft touch at the base of the ankle. There was no reaction from Danny there, so she moved down a bit, and began to press lightly. Still nothing. She moved to the inside tendon of his foot, and though it seemed uncomfortable, Danny said nothing. She glazed her fingers over the Peroneus tertius tendon, and Danny's entire body tense up from the pain. His clammed his eyes shut, and a suppressed moaned escaped from him in agony.

The only good news that came out of Danny's spike in pain was now Kim knew exactly where he'd hurt his foot. There wasn't very much she could do without the proper equipment, and cast-making plaster, but she remembered when Jim broke his elbow, her mother immediately did 4 things.

Elevation, Compression, Ice, and Rest.

Simple! The ice was going to be tricky; she could only hope that the others would hurry back soon because at this point, she didn't know where she was getting it.

But the other three were extremely simple. Easier than cleaning broken ribs or setting fractured cartilage.

She reached over to her tray, and picked up the bandage wrap. She began at the toes of the foot, and wrapped the beige fabric around a few times – slowly moving up the ankle. She made sure his foot stayed flexed, and tightened the bandage – pulling harder with each rotation.

Finally, she was able to tuck the end into the wrapped bandage, and placed his foot on top an upside-down bucket. She wished she had something softer like a pillow, but he'd have to hold on until they got home.

She turned back towards Danny, and noticed his heavy eyelids had once again closed.

"Danny!" she said firmly.

He didn't respond.

Kim immediately went into panic mode and touched the inflamed side of his foot while screaming his name.

He shook awake with shock, and blinked a few times. Once the initial shock had ebbed away, his eyelids became heavy once more, and he tiredly stared at Kim. His blue-green eyes were fading away – more and more as the seconds went by.

Kim felt bad for the ghost boy. He only wanted to sleep, and she wouldn't let him – she couldn't let him. He may never wake up, and the risk was too high.

"You'll be able to sleep soon Danny, just let me check your head first."

He lazily nodded as Kim danced her fingers around his temples and his frontal lobe. There was still the nasty bruise on his forehead, but he didn't so much as flinch when she touched it. She went through a mental list of the symptoms for a concussion, and asked Danny the necessary questions.

"Do you remember why we're here?"

"Vlad…" his muffled voice sounded.

"How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Two…"

"What's your dad's name?"

"Fenton… Jack…"

"Are you dizzy?"

"No…"

"Does your head hurt?"

"Like it's been cut open with a knife…"

That crossed off a few, but he had trouble walking (which was partly because of his foot), his speech was slurred, and he'd dry-heaved once. His eyes weren't moving weirdly and his pupils were both the same size; he obviously wasn't having seizure, either. His memory was fine and he didn't appear to be sensitive to light.

She mentally calculated the percent of symptoms he had versus the percent he wasn't showing and decided the 61% of the symptoms he was showing was too high not be suspicious. But, still it did prove if there was a concussion, it wasn't severe. Kim could stall no more; the boy had to sleep now.

She grabbed his right hand with hers, and began rubbing smooth circles with her thumb. Her serene voice was calm and motherly:

"You can go to sleep now Danny," she told him.

Danny wasted no time. His tealish eyes fluttered closed, but uncomfortably twitched inside their sockets. He opened once more, and looked – like a bruised, battered, and defeated boy – at Kim.

"Can you lay me down?" he asked with his exhausted eyes.

Kim crawled behind, and kneeled behind his back.

"And a blanket, too," she shivered.

She went to fetch a blanket from the other side of the van and crawled back over.

She kneeled behind him once more, and lifted his torso off the ground by the armpits, and slowly laid him flat on the ground. His head stayed in her lap, and she lovingly brushed his hair with her fingers. His black locks were so thick and silky that the strands of hair just slipped out her fingertips. Finally, she noticed the boy's breathing slow, and knew he was out. He was too tired to stay awake another moment. A pang of guilt swept over her as she realized she'd have to wake him up in 2 hours or so to ensure he was still okay.

But still, two hours was a long time, and by the looks of it she had time to kill. Ron had vanished, so she couldn't talk to him. She worried for a moment whether the 5 ghost-hunting teens could manage Vlad on their own, but decided that 5 against 1 was an unfair and simple match. So she stopped worrying and felt confident that the teens could hold their own. Now she just had to figure out how to pass the time.

She looked down at her beautifully damaged boyfriend, and felt feelings of pity, pride, and despair all collide into her.

Pity.
The poor boy was 17 and had gone through just so much.

Pride.
But look at how well he'd handled it! He had been willing to die (fighting albeit) to save his loved ones.

Despair.
And look at where that got him – he was on the threshold of death, and Kim knew that if she hadn't managed to help him in time, he might have decided to let go. From personal experience, she knew that that was the worst feeling to rise. Especially while fighting.

Giving up meant sacrifice; she'd felt it, and she wouldn't be here if Ron hadn't saved her like she'd just saved Danny.

Because the part that no one really understands is when you give up – when you decide there's nothing more you can fight for – it's almost impossible to come back. And Kim wasn't sure if Danny could do it.

But she had to get those thoughts out of her mind. It was possible that Danny had never given up, yet. Wasn't it?